Arizona's Crown Jewel

Sorry it's been a couple of weeks since our last post. We've been making our way from northern New Mexico through Arizona to the Grand Canyon and then Death Valley and California's gorgeous and varied landscapes, including Yosemite. Wow! What an incredible two weeks it's been: three very dramatic national parks, our 4-month roadtrip anniversary, several close-up visits with wild animals (a bobcat, there it is, I couldn't hold it in), and some serious hot springs! And did I mention about 2,000 photos? Right, so it's taking a lot of time to sort through and select ones to post for you. We're working on it piecemeal. Here is the first part from New Mexico through to the Grand Canyon in northern Arizona.

We spent the day at Canyon de Chelly (sounds like "d'shay") just a short hop west from Albuquerque. The canyon was beautiful, along with the weather that day, and we were able to hike to the bottom pretty easily to check out some sweet ruins. Pretty amazing that people have inhabited the canyon for thousands of years, different groups of native people, in fact. Currently the canyon is in Navajo country. We were amazed that the canyon floor is pretty large. There's a river, of course, but ample space for farming.

Canyon de Chelly

White House ruins

White House ruins closer view- can you see the two levels?

So after our hike down and back up, we drove south just an hour to a small town still on the Navajo Reservation (it's pretty huge) to visit our friends from Bethel, Louis and DezBaa. They live on-site at a hospital in a cute house that after only a few months is so infused with their personalities. (Dez is a dentist and Louis a mental health clinician.) This was great considering Dez was out of town for the weekend visiting family. We were glad to at least soak in her sweet energy for a night! Many thanks to Louis for cooking good food for us and taking time to just chat. Turns out we share a lot of interests that we never even realized in Bethel. One of the highlights of our short visit was getting to see beautiful wedding photos from their Navajo ceremony last year. Wow!

Louis lounging in their living room hammock chair.

From the res, we made our way to the grandest of all canyons...

And we were not disappointed! This was a first visit for both of us. The Grand Canyon is much more vast than I ever could have imagined. It's about a mile from the rim to the bottom where the Colorado River runs, and roughly ten miles across- from the South Rim to the North Rim. We spent three days checking out the South Rim (access to the North is closed in winter) from several viewpoints and we even hiked a couple miles into the canyon, despite icy conditions. Here are a few of the thousand or so photos we took. Mostly they all look the same. Ha!

Looking out from Hopi point. Can you see the Colorado River?
It's only visible from a few spots and it looks so tiny!

The colors of the canyon were constantly changing with the sunlight. Very impressive.

Cooking a late breakfast after watching the sun rise. Other visitors, mostly Japanese tourists,
were very impressed with our set up. Notice our fairly new Jerry Garcia sticker on Black Beauty.
Andrew held onto that sticker for nearly 10 years.

This was the lookout we hiked down to. Not too bad considering all
 the trails into the canyon are super steep, as you can imagine.

Lookout from Cedar Ridge on the South Kaibab trail. Only 2 miles into the canyon. The trail to the bottom is 9 miles down. Next time we really want to camp at the bottom for a few days!

Kristy sliding down the first of 8 icy switchbacks on her butt!
Safety first, kids. Take it slow.

The easy way down and back. Not for us young, spry hikers. Plus,  let's be real- we're cheap. :-)

Can you name this bird- Michele, Kevin or Eileen?

Whew, I'm exhausted and we've just drank 3 cups of tea each at a cafe in Mt. Shasta. Just a few more posts to get up to speed. Happy Valentine's day friends! And now we're off on the short drive to Oregon. Our in-person interview for the farm internship is tomorrow in Williams!! We feel really good about it but would certainly appreciate your good energy and prayers. Til next time...